The Use of Virtual Worlds in Chiropractic Education: Feasible or Foolish?

Glori Hinck, RD, MS, DCAssociate Professor Northwestern Health Sciences UniversityBloomington, MN USA

Project Team: Jeremy Thompson, BSLynne Hvidsten, DC, MBAMary Berg, MA

What is a virtual world?

2D or 3D computer-based simulated enviromment

Populated by avatars

Text and/or chat communication

Second Life

Most commonly used for educational purposes

Supports significant health care education presence

http://www.nmc.org/pdf/2007_Horizon_Report.pdf

“… virtual learning spaces will impact higher education and be adopted on a wide

scale basis within the next two to three years….

Second Life: Pharmacy education

UNC-Chapel Hill Virtual patient interviews

http://its.unc.edu/InsideITS/insideitsnews/CCM1_010995 5-30-09

Second Life: Medical education

Indiana University School of Medicine

Second Life: Nursing education

University of Auckland Postpartum simulation scenario

Second Life: Dentistry education

Texas A&M University of

Maryland

Second Life: Psychiatry

UC-Davis

Second Life in Medical & Health Education

Second Life: Chiropractic education?

A review of the literature and the Web finds no reference to utilizing Second Life as part of chiropractic education

Second Life: Chiropractic?

The Use of Virtual Worlds in Chiropractic Education: Feasible or Foolish?

Focus Group Students

Intrigued Concerns re:

time/technology Suggested

elective option for clinical education hours

NWHSU Second Life Project

Virtual Interview with Geriatric Patient

Winter 2010 5 students (T8) Avatar created

for 72 year-old real-world patient

Students created own avatars

Virtual Interview with Geriatric Patient

Met in virtual clinic

Interview using voice chat

Follow-up Survey Monkey

Moodle site

Moodle Patient

intake forms

Instructions Second Life

User Manual

Common Themes…..

Real time chat valuable

“…I could hear his voice and he responded to questions in a way that was not just a script”

Gained insight regarding the challenges in taking a history from a geriatric patient, “They tend to jump around…they also have a lot of other problems besides the primary complaint they are seeing you for.”

Challenges….

Primary Problem: Technical issues Software is free but must be downloaded Hardware requirements High-speed internet IT support SOUND!!! University firewalls **Significant time investment by

participants to learn how to navigate and interact within world

Challenges….

“Not being able to see the person, inspecting them, watching for visual cues”

Would rather interact with a patient in the real world.

These students had difficulty suspending disbelief enough to truly see the patient behind the avatar, and were frustrated by the inability to communicate through body language

Challenges….

The nature of chiropractic itself…

Feasible?

Image cc- xgray

Should chiropractic educators use virtual world technology?

Imperial College Virtual Hospital

Follow the trends?

Photo cc- treeday77

Millennial demand?

Recommendations

Continue to explore virtual chiropractic education Technology improving rapidly

Think creatively X-ray positioning, student dialogues with disability

groups, integrated clinical experiences

Dr. Glori HinckGlorious Guisse

Thank you!See you in Second Life?

Second Life

Second Life (http://secondlife.com/ Most popular virtual world platform for

education Computer/web- based simulated multi-

media environment 3-D social network

Users interact via avatars Voice chat/text chat/instant messaging

Integrate with Moodle via SLOODLE Boulos, M.N., Hetherington, L., & Wheeler, S. 2007. Second Life: an

overview of the potential of 3-D virtual worlds in medical & health education. Health Information and Libraries Journal. 24. 233-245.